Somalia-based Islamists militant group al-Shabaab has taken control of El Bur town located in the semi-autonomous region of Galmudug after Ethiopian forces vacated the town, a government official said.
The al-Qaeda affiliated group is seeking to drive an African Union-mandated peace-keeping force out of the Horn of Africa, with an ultimate aim of toppling the government and instilling a strict Islamist rule.
“Ethiopian troops left the town … thus al Shabaab captured it today,” Reuters reports Burhaan Warsame, Galmudug’s minister for ports and sea transport, to say.
The Ethiopian forces are part of the AMISOM force that also draws troops from Kenya, Uganda and Burundi.
The AMISOM troops captured the town from al-Shabaab in 2014, officials from the area said.
Upon the arrival of the al-Shabaab militants into the town, most residents fled into nearby bushlands, with reports indicating that the place was a ghost town when the Islamist militants entered the town.
Al Shabaab has been driven out of its strongholds in Somalia by AMISOM and Somali army offensives, although the group still controls some rural areas and often launches guerrilla-style assaults and frequent bomb attacks in the capital, Mogadishu.
Sheikh Hassan Yaqub, al Shabaab’s governor for Galmudug’s Galgadud region, where El Bur is located, confirmed the group had retaken the town.
